Washington, DC., (11/24/2020). The 11th series of BIANKA or Bincang Karya, a serial-webinar held by the Indonesian Embassy in Washington D.C., USA through the Attaché for Education and Culture, was held successfully and discussed about Comparative Tax Policy.
The recorded live event of BIANKA Seri-11 can be accessed in the following link http://bit.ly/fb-watch-bianka11
The webinar chaired by Prof. Popy Rufaidah, the Education and Cultural Attaché, invited Prof. Ron W. Zimmer, the Director of the Martin School of Public Policy and Administration at the University of Kentucky. In this occasion, Prof. Zimmer gave a brief overview about Martin School programs including Master of Pubic Administration (MPA) Program, Master of Public Policy (MPP) Program and the PhD Program. Another topic explained in the presentation was about the prerequisites for the PhD Program and some employment opportunities. Prof. Zimmer also shared various examples of journal publications of Martin School Faculty and research areas of the faculty such as in the fields of tax policy and education.
The event continued by a presentation from Himawan Saputro, SST, MIDP., a PhD candidate of Martin School of Public Policy and Administration, University of Kentucky, Lexington. Mr Saputro explained about challenges to strengthening the Indonesian tax capacity. In his presentation, Mr. Saputro focused on what cause government tax is so much or so little. He, then, continued by discussing deeper about several topics related to it such as determinants of tax capacity, responses to turnover tax implementation, responses to VAT threshold expansion, growing inequality, plummeting progressivity, etc. To conclude the presentation, he emphasized that in order to increase the tax ratio; we need to strengthen the tax instruments which include tax policy and tax administration.
Meanwhile, Partomuan T. Juniul, SST., MIDP., who is also a PhD candidate of Martin School of Public Policy and Administration, University of Kentucky, Lexington delivered a presentation about some opportunities to strengthen Indonesian tax capacity. He emphasized on four steps to strengthen the tax capacity and explained them further in his presentation. Regarding to the opportunities for the tax administration, Mr. Juniult also discussed briefly each possible opportunity including more tax on top income earners, the missing middle, promising result from previous reform, toward less audit, and Core tax reform. To end his presentation, he stated that there are two opportunities for tax capacity. First, the tax administration including unbiased compliance measurement (randomized audit program) and refocusing reform agenda. Second, the tax policy which includes increasing top marginal income tax rates, reducing VAT and turnover tax threshold and strengthening anti-corruption agenda.
The last speaker was Prof. Dr. Haula Rosdiana, M.Si from the Faculty of Administrative Sciences, University of Indonesia. Prof. Rosdiana who is the Chairman of the Political Cluster of National Taxation, Welfare and Resilience) of the Center for Governance Public Policy and Business Studies, University of Indonesia represented the Indonesian State University Chancellors Council. In her presentation, Prof. Rusdiana discussed about the taxation system in the Omnibus Law Era: quo vadis? Several topics were explained in brief including Indonesia’s Income Tax Rates, Value Added Tax (VAT) System, etc. She also discussed whether or not regional tax and regional retribution (PDRD) will change after the Omnibus Law.